Why we need a better story

Human beings have always been storytellers. The stories we tell ourselves have immense power to shape us and the world around us, for better or for worse. Our shared stories and values are the golden threads that bind our families, communities, and nations together, up and down the generations.

But across the UK and in many other developed nations, these stories have been undermined and deconstructed, causing us to lose confidence in ourselves, and the fabric of our society to become frayed and fragmented.

Studies by the Legatum Institute and other think tanks demonstrate there is much in our heritage in liberal democratic nations to be proud of. The last two hundred years have seen an astonishing uptick in living standards. On every metric, from infant mortality to the education of women, life has got better. Meanwhile from civil liberties and constitutional restraints to democratic participation, we see that healthy institutions lay the groundwork for prosperity.

Why, then do many feel we are in a permanent state of crisis, with ‘permacrisis’ the word of the year? Corrosive cultural criticism in recent decades has left the coherence of our cultural stories hanging by a thread. Our lack of a common narrative has left us feeling disillusioned and disempowered in a time when humanity is more prosperous, healthy, and better resourced than at any point in history. Physical health may be better than ever, but mental health and loneliness are spiralling. Our institutions have huge value and a strong track record, but we no longer trust them.

In this destabilised context, we have faced a succession of cultural ‘shakings’ – Ukraine, Covid, Cost of Living, Climate, the rise of China and rumblings in the Taiwan strait: each of these phenomena, in their own way is contributing to a sense of anxiety. But without common cultural narratives and the philosophical reservoirs needed to provide individuals and communities with resilience, we are in danger of losing connection with, and confidence in our historic foundations on which the prosperity of our nations has been built. It is people, taking responsibility, who have built our nations.

But instead of trusting our people and raising up responsible citizens, we reach for increasing levels of government action. Top-down solutions are presented as the only way out of our challenges instead of delegated responsibility. But complex problems rarely have single, univariate solutions. We saw Covid case numbers drive policy making at the expense of the poor in the lockdown period; and now we risk driving policy interventions to address environmental concerns without having an honest conversation about the trade-offs for the poor at home or in developing and emerging nations.

We clearly need a better story and that is why we are forming the new ‘Alliance for Responsible Citizenship’ (ARC). We cannot address a negative story by being against the permacrisis, declinist, power-based narrative of today. We can only let go of a negative story by taking hold of a better story. Throughout history there has been a better story that has called us higher and not lower, into collaboration and not division, into responsibility and not passivity, into building and not tearing down. Our mission is to create a community that is committed to providing a positive and hope-filled vision for the future.

Our organising committee draws together public intellectuals from Arthur Brooks to Niall Ferguson to Jordan Peterson, along with politicians and business leaders from around the world. This community will gather for the first time in London later this year for a conference of more than a thousand international senior leaders from politics, media, culture, business, and academia.

ARC aims to address the fundamental questions of our time. We will aim to explore a better story for the family, community and nation, while also exploring how each individual can be empowered to live a fulfilled, responsible life as a citizen.
We will wrestle with the need to responsibly steward the environment and our natural resources so that all people can benefit from access to affordable energy, while also mitigating against future environmental challenges.

Current trends towards crony capitalism, gigantism and excessive corporate power will be critiqued and we will explore ways that genuinely open markets and voluntary exchange can be fostered to create prosperity for all, including the ‘left behind’ of globalisation.

But ultimately, the ARC community will re-evaluate humanity’s direction of travel and revitalise our vision of what it means to flourish.

I am joining ARC, because I believe that now is the moment for this conversation. I have spent much of my life attempting to help those on the margins of society, working to support those in poverty from the refugee to the addict to those who are homeless as they rebuild their lives. This has shown me that the stories we tell ourselves have the power to bring transformation. This is true of individuals, families, communities and nations.

This is why I am optimistic about human potential and hopeful for our future. Through ARC, we want to realise this potential for good.

Martin Luther King Jr. famously said: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”

We need a better story, that is why we are founding ARC.

This piece was initially published by the Telegraph